


Though the World Moves On, the Lost Have Not

by eadreytheiptscray



Category: Pacific Rim (Movies)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Compliant, Gen, Loss of Limbs, Mild Blood, What happened between Raleigh leaving the PPDC and Operation Pitfall, Yancy Becket Lives, yancy's pov
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-29
Updated: 2020-02-29
Packaged: 2021-02-28 03:27:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22957165
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eadreytheiptscray/pseuds/eadreytheiptscray
Summary: Alternate title: Yancy Lives Because I Say SoYancy Becket wakes up on the deck of the Saltchuck and spends the next five years, four months searching for his baby brother.
Relationships: Raleigh Becket & Yancy Becket
Comments: 4
Kudos: 91





	Though the World Moves On, the Lost Have Not

Technically, Yancy died.

That would happen when an alien behemoth with claws twice your size rips you out of an equally gargantuan metal beast, severing a neural link between yourself and your co-pilot. Combine choppy ocean waters with cumbersome body armor, and it's a miracle Yancy's body had been found at all.

But somehow, he wakes up in a closet-sized room lit by flickering fluorescent bulbs, a silent scream on his lips and pain— _so much pain_ —radiating from his chest, right shoulder, and skull. Everything is hazy, and he'd mistake the figures lurking over him for ghosts were they not wearing highlighter-yellow rain suits.

_Need to eject need to eject need to eject_

He's got to tell someone. But who? And why?

"Yer a'right, sonny," came from one of the figures. "Jus' lie down—"

He tries sitting up, but firm hands clamp down on his left shoulder. He sags back on the table, dizzy from the effort. Muffled shouts float over him as the world goes hazy again.

Yancy learns three things when he wakes up again, almost twelve hours later in a tiny hospital bed:

One, that he had the crew of the _Saltchuck_ to thank for surviving a dunk in the Pacific Ocean mostly intact.

Two, that Lady Danger made it back to shore by morning, short one pilot.

Three, that Raleigh Becket was not okay.

* * *

Contacting people (like your only brother) is hard when you can't remember your name half the time, much less how to get in touch with people who might be looking for you.

And when Yancy could remember the important stuff, he couldn't do anything about it with more pain medication than blood coursing through his veins.

Three weeks pass before he feels remotely close to okay. His doctors had gotten in touch with Marshal Stacker Pentecost at the Anchorage Shatterdome, but by then it's too late. 

Raleigh had been discharged and had disappeared.

* * *

"You're a sight for sore eyes," Tendo says as Yancy drags himself out of sleep.

He squints against the bright yet cold and sterile white walls. Tendo is wearing a smile, but the puffy red outlines of his eyes betray how he's really feeling.

"And I feel terrific, too," Yancy croaks. He cracks a small smile, tasting blood when he licks his chapped lips. "Where's Raleigh?"

Tendo's smile fades, and he sags back in the rickety chair. "No one's seen him since he left. Believe me, Yance, I told Pentecost not to—"

"Protocol." Yancy nods. "I figured."

"He left in a hurry. And, uh, left some things behind."

 _Uh-oh._ "What kind of things?"

Tendo drops an overstuffed duffle bag on the bed. With a grunt, Yancy reaches forward to unzip the bag. 

Inside are two matching leather jackets.

* * *

How do you predict where an impulsive person will go?

Yancy often wonders this when he's alone in his hospital room, which is too often. At least ruminating gives him something to do besides wonder how he got from Lady Danger's Conn-Pod to the _Saltchuck_ , or pay attention to the phantom pain in his right shoulder (although he sometimes finds himself scratching at the bandages around the stump).

Sometimes, he dreams what Raleigh sees: the wood grain of a stained bar top, a lazily circling ceiling fan, a snowy forest through a cloudy window. Maybe Raleigh is still in Alaska—there's a quilt of white covering the world outside Yancy's hospital room.

But it's not like he can chase those leads anytime soon. His doctors don't release him for another month, and then it's on to physical therapy.

(Once, after a particularly frustrating day, uncharacteristic impulsiveness that must've rubbed off on him spurs Yancy to storm out of the hospital. He collapses in the snow half a block away, cold and exhausted.)

By the time Yancy can walk without clinging to a railing, the world had all but forgotten about the tragedy off the Alaskan coastline. Pentecost is preoccupied with so many other tragedies, and Tendo offers little more than a starting point for Yancy's quest.

With one of Tendo's hand-me-down coats draped around his shoulders, Yancy sets out to find his brother.

* * *

Anchorage.

Sheldon Point.

Nome.

Yancy plays hopscotch for three years, grasping at impressions through Raleigh's fast-fading neural connection and years' worth of memories in hopes of finding a clue to his brother's whereabouts. He stops by every fishing boat, machine shop, and restaurant kitchen in town.

Nothing.

Posters for the so-called Wall of Life ( _yeah, right_ ) catch his eye, but he doubts Raleigh would want to build something like that. Walls aren't indestructible; time, Mother Nature, or a determined kaiju could make quick work of them. He knows his brother, and his brother would rather get his hands bloody defending the powerless.

Desperation changes his mind.

But by the time Yancy visits the closest construction site, finished just a week prior, he discovers the crew had scattered to other parts of the Wall.

He flips a coin and heads south.

* * *

Five years, four months, and still no sign of Raleigh.

The days blur together. Well, most of them. He'd heard about the Tailsplitter attack on the radio while driving to the store on a rare sunny day. And he'd watched Mutavore tear through Sydney's Wall from the staticky TV in his last motel room.

The day two kaiju attack Hong Kong, he's stewing in the melancholy of a dimly lit bar.

 _At least they're nowhere near here_ , he thinks bitterly. Shaky news footage on a TV behind him shows the two beasts tearing into two jaegers.

The harbor erupts with an underwater explosion, and Yancy turns away.

* * *

A few days later, three kaiju make headlines.

Two jaegers dive into the Pacific Ocean.

Yancy doesn't bother turning on the TV. He knows how it'll end.

* * *

Except the quiet bar below his dingy apartment starts buzzing with optimism. Muffled cheers pull him out of his stupor and beckon him downstairs.

He steps into the bar just as the newscaster announces a second escape pod had burst from the waters above the Breach.

_Did it—?_

"It worked," the bartender mumbles, wiping the inside of a bone-dry glass with his dish towel. "I can't believe it worked."

Yancy sips a beer as he soaks in the news via ticker headlines. The Breach had been sealed. Two jaegers had gone down with a nuke, and two pilots had survived. No kaiju would ever threaten the world again.

A few hours later, a weary-looking yet familiar face ( _so it's Marshal Hansen now_ , Yancy thinks) steps up to a podium. The speech he gives is straight to the point, a summary of what happened deep beneath the Pacific and what would happen to the organization that had protected humanity from the beasts below.

And then Raleigh's name rolls off his tongue, sending pins and needles down Yancy's phantom limb.

Yancy had booked plane tickets to Hong Kong within the hour.

* * *

Press and protesters swarm around Hong Kong Shatterdome, forcing Yancy to turn back to his hotel room. Fortunately, Tendo still has the same number.

"I don't know how he'll react at seeing you," Tendo says, voicing what Yancy had been thinking. "Besides, he's being treated for radiation sickness."

"Call me when he gets out, then. And try to break the news to him gently."

"I'll see what I can do, brother."

* * *

The PPDC had officially disbanded by the time Tendo calls Yancy, a month later, so at least protocol is one less thing to worry about. They meet only a handful of personnel on their journey through the bowels of Hong Kong Shatterdome.

Tendo slows down one particular corridor, then ascends some steps to rap on a metal door.

A gruff "yeah?" comes within, followed by a heavy _clank_.

Yancy had frozen halfway down the hallway, and he brushes invisible dust off his folded sleeve distractingly.

The door opens. Tendo grins and motions to Yancy. A mop of blonde hair peeks out from the doorway, followed by a slender figure in a navy sweater.

Raleigh's eyes widen, and the world freezes. Yancy can hear his heartbeat thrumming in his ears, and he's not sure why his feet won't move. 

"Yancy?" The softest whisper floats down the hallway, but it echoes loudly in Yancy's mind.

"Hey, kid," he croaks. 

The air leaves his lungs and tears drip down his face as his little brother closes the gap between them, squeezing Yancy into a long-overdue hug.


End file.
